December 30, 2017

HUMACAO, Puerto Rico — The world-renowned resort community here is a ghost town. No one sits by the three-tiered pool even though it's high tourist season. At the area's largest hospital, four of the five floors are closed. Long lines still form for ice and water. Livelihoods have disappeared. "No hay luz" (there is no power) is a repeated refrain from almost everyone.

ENGLISH:
It has been three months since Hurricane Maria entered @Puerto Rico like a battering ram through Humacao, sweeping through this southeastern coastal city and into the island's history as its worst natural disaster.
But the catastrophe continues. Still largely without electricity and clean water, people who withstood the hurricane's force feel abandoned and question whether the U.S. government cares about their survival.
Just about 45 minutes from the capital of San Juan — longer with the heavy traffic now on the main highway — Humacao used to draw tourists and Puerto Rican vacationers every year. Charter yachts took passengers through the warm waters to the smaller Puerto Rico island of Vieques. It is known for the world-class golf course at the Palmas del Mar resort and its pharmaceutical and medical supplies industry.
But as of mid-December, the U.S.-based pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Myers Squibb — which manufactures cardiovascular and anti-diabetes products and employs about 300 people — was still running on generators. More than half of the city's schools were closed, along with an untold number of businesses, including Humacao's major shopping center, which housed Walmart, J.C. Penney, Marshall's and the local Capri department store, among others.
"We are still in Maria. Maria has not left Humacao," said Jahaira Paris, owner of a local drugstore, Farmacia Central, in Humacao's city center. Although her business is operating on generators and seeing a spike in sales because the big shopping center is closed, she waits for electricity at home and only recently got running water.
This area has been the last to receive help, has been the area that help has come to the slowest, even though it's where Maria got its start, said Puerto Rico Sen. José Dalmau Santiago. Right after the hurricane, there were no images from Humacao of mudslides and bridge collapses and refugee camps as in other communities, so "they looked here too late," he said.
Dalmau, former president of the Senate Health Committee, worries about the effect of this limbo on the city's pharmaceutical industry and the jobs it provides.
"It is a profound problem and I'm not sure if the government knows the magnitude of it," Dalmau said.
The endless delay in providing power to the city is the result of several factors, including bureaucratic stumbling over the restoration to a long-outdated electrical grid run by a bankrupt power company that is $9 billion in debt. The Army Corps of Engineers considers Humacao "ground zero" for the force of the hurricane, which left the power grid destroyed and in need of a complete rebuild, according to Jay Field, public affairs officer for the Corps' power restoration task force.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ESPANOLHan pasado tres meses desde que el huracán María ingresó a Puerto Rico como un ariete a través de Humacao, pasando por esta ciudad costera del sureste y en la historia de la isla como su peor desastre natural.Pero la catástrofe continúa. Aún en gran parte sin electricidad ni agua potable, las personas que resistieron la fuerza del huracán se sienten abandonadas y cuestionan si el gobierno de EE. UU. Se preocupa por su supervivencia.A solo 45 minutos de la capital de San Juan, más tiempo con el intenso tráfico que hay ahora en la carretera principal, Humacao solía atraer turistas y veraneantes puertorriqueños cada año. Los yates alquilados llevaron a los pasajeros a través de las cálidas aguas a la isla más pequeña de Vieques, en Vieques. Es conocido por su campo de golf de clase mundial en Palmas del Mar y su industria farmacéutica y de suministros médicos.Pero a partir de mediados de diciembre, el gigante farmacéutico Bristol-Myers Squibb, con sede en los Estados Unidos, que fabrica productos cardiovasculares y antidiabéticos y emplea a unas 300 personas, todavía funcionaba con generadores. Más de la mitad de las escuelas de la ciudad estaban cerradas, junto con un número incalculable de negocios, incluido el principal centro comercial de Humacao, que albergaba Walmart, J.C. Penney, Marshall y los grandes almacenes locales Capri, entre otros."Todavía estamos en María. María no se fue de Humacao", dijo Jahaira Paris, dueña de una farmacia local, Farmacia Central, en el centro de la ciudad de Humacao. Aunque su negocio está operando con generadores y observa un aumento en las ventas debido a que el gran centro comercial está cerrado, ella espera la electricidad en el hogar y solo recientemente obtuvo agua corriente.Esta área ha sido la última en recibir ayuda, ha sido el área donde la ayuda ha llegado más lentamente, a pesar de que es donde María comenzó, dijo el Senador José Dalmau Santiago. Justo después del huracán, no había imágenes de Humacao de derrumbes y derrumbes de puentes y campamentos de refugiados como en otras comunidades, por lo que "miraron aquí demasiado tarde", dijo.